What you need to know about electroconvulsive therapy

Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT) has been used for more than 75 years and remains one of the most effective treatments in psychiatry for most major mental disorders.

It is especially effective for affective disorders, which include those suffering from severe episodes of major depression. Other indications include psychotic depression, delirious mania, catatonia, post-partum depression and post-partum psychosis. The effectiveness of this treatment in alleviating symptoms ranges from 75-90 per cent.

The ECT Program at Waypoint has been expanding and adapting to the growing need for the past several years, and we are now able to treat all Waypoint inpatients and outpatients.

Our new ECT Suite is located on the 2nd floor of the Toanche building (Main entrance). We are providing approximately 1400 treatments per year to patients from all over our catchment area and areas that are not able to provide service to their patients. We provide treatments for our patients every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

Our team consists of psychiatrists, anesthetists, recovery room nurses and ECT nurses. All of our psychiatrists and ECT nurses have education and fellowships in Electroconvulsive Therapy and attend ongoing continuous education. We provide education to families, medical and nursing students and are happy to speak with anyone in the facility that would like to know more about our program.

Referrals are accepted through our Central Intake Office. All referrals will be reviewed by our ECT consulting psychiatrist to determine appropriateness of the referral. The ECT team will maintain contact with the patient throughout this referral and treatment process.